Sept, 2023.
On paper it looked reasonable. Significant, but reasonable. Day 1, a 'mere' `30 miles and `3k+ of climbing. NBD right? During the planning phase it looked like day 2 was going to be the real deal. Roughly the same mileage but 4500 ft of climbing on faint roads, but high into the mountains and exploring old mining ruins. I expected the 3rd and final day to be a reasonable climb out over Hinkey summit and a fast downhill back into the town of Paradise Valley where we started. Kurstin of Bikepacking Northern Nevada joined me for this trip. We took our Tenkara rods expecting to have some time to fish in the mountain streams.
This trip manifested as a mix of good stuff, hard stuff and ultimately route bail on my part. Day 1 kicked my butt, hard! After an easy initial 7 miles or so we began the climb, err, push up ultra steep, ultra chunky china grade on what the maps name China Rd. Although the grade mellowed out the chunkyness (is that a word?) did not and continued intermittantly through the remainder of the day. Early in the day we also fought through dried weed forests that would catch in your derailleur and cranks forcing you to again and again clear your drivetrain. As frustrating as this may sound the route passed through some incredibly beautiful and rugged terrrain. Intitially deep canyons and later valley and hill country. We did stop briefly at one stream crossing to fish a bit but neither of us saw or felt any fish. By afternoon, I was cooked and Kurstin was being forced to wait for what seemed excessively long, for me to catch up. Thankfully he was very gracious about it and never showed any frustration. Finally we had a long downhill into an old ranch bordering a nice meadow and with a creek nearby. We decided to camp there. After filtering water Kurstin brought out his tenkara rod and headed back over to the creek to try his hand at fishing again. I however determined to practice what a nephew had termed "deckabout." That's when you're too tired to do anything but sit in a chair and look out at the world. So I pulled out my collapsible camp chair and practiced my skills.
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
That evening and during the night I thought a lot how the following day would play out since the 'easy' day had humbled me so soundly. I started looking at the maps I had downloaded to my phone and saw a route that would eliminate the big climb up over Buckskin Mountain. In the morning we woke to a bush plane flying low over the abundant cattle sounding a whistling air horn to herd the cattle. Modern ranching I guess. The plane made numerous passes and at one point it looked like it was going to land but finally climbed back out. I approached Kurstin with the suggestion of deleting the Buckskin climb and cutting directly across to intersect the original route. He was like "Yeah sure! Sounds good." Easy going, adaptable, competant and fun. A great partner.
The riding was on much better roads and I felt much better. The shortcut we followed cut off 22 miles and lots of climbing. The terrain we crossed so far today was high desert meadow and creek valley type terrain. It was still early when we arrived below the final climb up over Hinkey summit so we just decided to go all the way back to town that day vs stay overnight again. The grade was surprisingly mellow but I was still walking some of it. As we climbed we entered Aspen forest country. Very beautiful and a stark contrast to the volcanic ground we crossed the prior day. At the summit a huge rock face with a large natural arch overlooks the pass and the valley below.
Kurstin says "there's gotta be (climbing) bolts, c'mon...!.
My reply was "I doubt it, it's too isolated." Moments later we spotted bolts going up the wall. Well. I looked it up on mountain project when I got home. Yep, sure enough. Hinkey summit climbing area.
There was nothing left but the fast downhill and the ride back into town. The downhill was just that too, fast and fun! In no time we arrived back at the truck. Paradise Valley is a lovely little town with very friendly folks, nearly everyone gave us a wave and a smile. We had a cold beer at the local bar, inquired about the saturday night steak BBQ for future reference and began the long drive home.
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
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| Photo credit Kurstin G |
The stats via my Wahoo Element Bolt:
Day 1: 26.6 miles, 3392 ft climbing
Day2: 33.54 miles, 3058 ft climbing
Bike setup: Binary Bicycles Kinetik V2 hardtail. 29x3" tires. Bikepacking bags and custom rear rack.
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